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Abstract

The radioallergosorbent test (RAST) is an in vitro procedure for the detection of specific IgE antibodies in serum. It offers smaller risk to patients than in vivo tests and , in addition, the in vitro data are objective and reproducible.However, one of its drawbacks is that it is unable to detect whether the target organ is itself hyper-reactive to related allergens. The nasal provocation test, on the other hand, provides information on the sensitivity of the nasal mucosa to those allergens, but it may induce systemic anaphylactic reaction and produce both false positive and false negative results. Furthermore, it is neither very quantitative nor objective, so that results may fluctuate.In the present report, the so-called tissue-RAST (t-RAST), an allergological test devised by authors and reported elsewhere , was performed in two groups of patients, one with the three symptoms of sneezing attacks, serous hypersecretion, and nasal blockage and the other with nasal blockage only. The results obtained were compared with those obtained by a series of established allergy tests.T-RAST brought about objective data as serum-RAST did, and could evaluate the sensitivity of the nasal mucosa to allergens as the nasal provocation test could. It may be concluded that t-RAST is a reliable method for quantitatively analizing specific IgE antibodies in the nasal mucosa. It is of much use for allergy specialists as it will unequivocally and easily clarify cases of localized nasal allergy .